Pages

You love the blog, so subscribe to the Beervana Podcast on iTunes or Soundcloud today!

Thursday, February 25, 2010

La Folie is Really Good

On my way to a social gathering last night, I stopped off at Belmont Station to pick up a range of Baltic porters (from Poland, Russia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania). (Report on that at some point--it was fascinating.) As I charged in, I was brought up short by a crowd just inside the door. A New Belgium tasting--bonus! Some comments:

1. NB was pouring the beer in a strictly prescribed fashion: Fat Tire from a can, Ranger, and then either La Folie or Kriek. The guy who was pouring the beer seemed to be centrally interested in talking Fat Tire. I accepted the pour to get along to the good stuff.

2. I managed to skip the Ranger, thinking that a sharply hoppy beer is a poor lead-in to a kriek. Interesting decision by the brewery.

3. La Folie is an exceptional beer. So much complexity (full review here). They were also pouring a Lips of Faith-series kriek, which was a collaborative brew with Frank Boon. Boon spontaneously fermented a kriek, sent it to Fort Collins, where it was blended with a beer from NB (I missed what their contribution was). Interestingly, I found it to be far less complex and interesting than La Folie. Interesting, because Frank Boon's lambics are my favorite, and are to my mind the most complex, with layered sourness that never gets too dry or funky.

4. The guy pouring the beer seemed actively irritated by my questions, when I could get his attention. He was far more interested in promoting canned Fat Tire. Maybe just an off day, but I gotta say, if someone's interested in talking to you about your beer, talk to him. A bit off-putting, but essentially beside the point. He was offering me free beer and I was happy to accept.____________PHOTO:Atlanta Beer Master. | Share

8 comments:

La Folie was the 1st beer to introduce me to sours and now I can't get enough of them. I go back to this beer as often as I can. Some of the earlier La Folie was a tad on the vinegary side but last couple of years it is top notch.

"It's interesting the NB rep would be so focused on Fat Tire when he could instead really push some of the $14 LoF bombers!"

I didn't have much of a chance to speak with Matt (the NBB rep) the other night because he was busy pouring beer and talking to "real" customers, but from what IO gathered they're really trying to make a push for the cans.

One thing I did get out of him was that Sunshine Wheat and Ranger IPA are debuting in cans in CO (or are already out), and they're trying to get people over the lingering stigma of "cans = cheap, metallic, and bad."

He also spent a couple minutes talking about how they spent months trying to get FT in can to taste like FT from a keg, and the only way they could get it to work was through "can conditioning." Supposedly they fill the cans with (almost) flat beer, dose them with yeast and sugar, and put them "in the rafters" for a week or two to carbonate properly.